The stars come out to celebrate

Fan mania is obviously a serious business in Taipei. They come in organised groups, with hired vans.

The Channel [V] Chinese Top 20 Annual Awards 96 was scheduled to start at 7.30pm last Saturday. But for the fans it began early that afternoon with the staking out of the airport arrival lounge to meet their Hong Kong idols, Jacky Cheung Hok-yau and Andy Lau Tak-wah, who were scheduled to fly in for the show.

Cheung, who arrived on a flight with a group of Hong Kong journalists, was greeted with sharp trills even while he was waiting for his luggage to appear on the carousel. Attempting to avoid an increasingly excited crowd, he tried to make his way out of a side entrance but to no avail. All afternoon female teenagers camped in the lobby and outside the Far Eastern Plaza in central Taipei. At 4pm, their patience was rewarded as Lau tried to make a quick exit to his luxury trailer.

Taipei fans are certainly more organised than Hong Kong ones, who usually wait quietly for a picture or an autograph, barring the odd few who hop into taxis in pursuit of their idols.

Before Lau had settled into his trailer seat, about 80 of them had already boarded four waiting vans which sped after Lau's vehicle. It gives a new meaning to the words, 'driver, follow that car'.

'There are companies which lease out these vans specially for such uses,' one record company executive explained later. 'All the drivers know what to do. One time, we hired a small van for our artist, but the fans turned up in a luxury bus.' By the time everyone started arriving at the Taipei Convention Centre where the awards ceremony was being held, another group had begun to camp outside the centre waiting to get their seats inside.